Laura Kessel is managing editor of The News-Herald in Willoughby. She writes a weekly column and shares her thoughts here.

Friday, October 12, 2012

He has a way of making you think you can do it

This column appeared in the Sept. 29, 2012, edition of The News-Herald.

The last time I saw Chris Yano, she was wearing a crown and holding a bouquet of roses.

That’s because she’s royalty.

The
2012 News-Herald/Lake County Fair Commerce Queen hasn’t given up her
day job, which is leading the Fairport Harbor Senior Center and its huge
group of participants through activities that include Wii bowling and
golf, numerous classes and games such as billiards and cards.

Yano’s an impressive woman, getting help
from a few volunteers as she encourages these seniors ages 55 and older
to remain active in their minds as well as their bodies.

It’s that last part that brought me back to Fairport with a good friend this week.

Jaime
Brenkus, who owns Slim & Fit Personal Weight Loss & Fitness,
didn’t hesitate when I asked him if he’d be willing to head out to the
facility at the corner of High and East streets.

I told him Yano’s
group of feisty participants takes part in a weights-and-bands class a
few times each week and that they’d be thrilled to have him come out
with his special brand of nutrition information.

When you spend time
with Brenkus, you learn pretty quickly that he’s motivational. He’s also
so full of energy that you’ll be bounding around the room to keep up
with him as he talks.

But my favorite thing about Brenkus is his use of catchphrases.

There’s one for every subject.

“Your best pieces of fitness equipment are your knife and fork.”

“Nothing tastes as good as slim feels.”

They
all make sense. As we tell the folks taking part in Lighten Up, The
News-Herald’s annual weight-loss contest, you don’t have to exercise at
all to lose weight. Cut your caloric intake, you’ll start to lose. And,
as anyone who’s lost weight has learned, you do feel a lot better after
you’ve lost some of your extra pounds.

When Brenkus stepped in front
of the 25 seniors who set up in the Senior Center’s cafeteria, he looked
them in the eyes and delivered the same speech I’ve heard countless
times during Lighten Up meetings and during his talks with those he’s
training.

He tells you what you already know.

Everyone knows how to lose weight. It’s simple. If you don’t eat, you don’t gain. If you eat less, you’ll lose.

Brenkus, though, has a way of making you think you can do it. And that’s powerful.

When
he asked if the class could tell him how many calories equals a pound.
“Thirty-five hundred,” about half the class correctly yelled back.

“As we eat those calories, if we don’t expend them, they turn to fat,” Brenkus said.

He said the weights class they do a few times a week is a great way to keep the fat at bay.

When it came time for the fitness aspects of Brenkus’ visit, I was curious how class members would handle it.

I
need not have worried. Not a single person stopped during the hourlong
session of lifting hand weights and stretching fitness bands.

He
even pushed them further than they normally go, asking for 15
repetitions of each exercise. I realized it after a little while,
because the woman standing to Brenkus’s left during the workout kept
saying “nine” when they’d done a bunch. I had a feeling that she wanted
to stop at 10, but she gamely followed the rest of the class and made it
to 15.

Brenkus played off the groans from the jokers in the crowd. A
couple of the gentlemen in the group were cutups who’d played the same
role in the class I’d seen Yano conduct previously. There’s no shortage
of whining, even as they masterfully complete each challenge laid out by
the teacher.

At one point, though, one of the women in the crowd yelled out, “I don’t know about this exercise, but you sure can count.”

Yano
stood to Brenkus’ right, taking on the role of a regular student. She
seemed to really get into the class, pumping her weights along with
everyone else. She said a couple of times that she was learning some new
tricks for the group.

Brenkus said he was impressed by the eagerness of the group to take part and that they handled it so easily.

The class should be on alert, though. Brenkus said he’d consider coming back for more workouts.

I’ll
remind them of something that Brenkus said during the workout. When
someone admitted they were praying for deliverance from the torture they
were enduring, Brenkus piped up, playing off the Catholic faith he
realized he shared with a few in the crowd.

“Bless me father, for I have sinned. I’m doing an act of repetition, instead of contrition.”